


you were right

by basementmixtape



Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: Boys In Love, F/F, Friendship, Idiots in Love, M/M, MLM WLW solidarity, Max and Will are best friends, Period Typical Homophobia, Soft Boys, goofy and groovy 80’s shenanigans, looking canon dead in the eyes before you murder it, low effort fluff, mike wheeler: bisexual disaster, period typical biphobia, will and el and max are best friends
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-05-09
Updated: 2020-12-23
Packaged: 2021-03-03 04:28:37
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 3,641
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24088912
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/basementmixtape/pseuds/basementmixtape
Summary: “Started eating at your favourite placeThe night I stopped eating with youYou were always trying to force my tasteBut now I'm eating there 'cause I want toYou were right, I liked itYou were wrong, I was a good friend to you”Will comes to his senses and leaves Mike at the mall the day El dumps his ass.
Relationships: Eleven | Jane Hopper/Max Mayfield, Will Byers/Mike Wheeler
Comments: 12
Kudos: 104





	1. body

**Author's Note:**

> alternately titled: will byers has self respect
> 
> just a little sweet bit of fluffy fic :)
> 
> title and summary quote from ‘you were right’ by julia jacklin

"Will, are you alright?" Max was kneeling in front of him, her blue eyes intent and bright on his, red hair in wild waves, nails painted an electric green. He nodded hastily, glancing at Mike and Lucas inside the store behind him. Mike looked adorably distressed, staring at the prices of everything with intent black eyes and a hand in his hair, cheeks pink. She raised an eyebrow. "You sure?"

"Yeah, I'm alright, really." El appeared behind her, hair in waves and a little clip, eyes wide and wondering, she had a new dress on, she looked girly, pretty.

"Will!" She pulled him into a hug, surprising him a little. "What are you doing here?"

"Well..." He rubbed the back of his neck nervously, avoiding her sharp eyes. "Mike is-" Her smile fell.

"A liar." She said matter-of-factly. He paled. "It doesn't matter, he doesn't matter. Do you wanna get ice cream?" Max nodded encouragingly. He looked back at Mike and Lucas, who had been anxiously fixated on the girls for days.

"Sure." She gave a dazzling, delighted smile, and linked arms with him, Max doing the same on his other side.

"Those idiots have been dragging you around for days, haven't they?" He shrugged.

"It's not so bad." Max snorted, her pretty freckled face so startling in the clean light of the mall. She fit, a normal teenager for once instead of a monster fighting badass.

"A real ringing endorsement, you should ditch them and stick with us for now, I promise we're more fun." She winked, pulling him into Scoops Ahoy.

Robin got each of them a scoop of strawberry, El getting rainbow sprinkles, Will doing the same, Max cringing in disgust. Steve came in behind her, eyes going wide.

"El? Are you even allowed to be out?" She flushed, and all of them burst into startled laughter, immediately retreating from the ice cream shop.

"You really shouldn't let them just drag you around, I know you think talking about us is boring." He shrugged, going a little red.

"It does get old after a while." El hefted her shopping bags, following Max out the doors to the mall, stifling a laugh.

"I bet it's unbearable-" She stopped in her tracks, meeting Mike's wild eyes, his stare stopping her cold. She licked her ice cream cone.

"You've got to be shitting me." Max walked toward them, slow. "What a surprise."

"What are you doing here?" He dropped his bike to the ground, staring at El, he turned on Max. "You know she isn't supposed to be here."

"So? What is she, your little pet?" Mike's expression twisted, confusion. El's hardened, stiff as iron.

"Yeah, am I your _pet_?"

"What?" He stared, hands dangling at his side, his eyes flitting to Will, who stood between the girls, averting his eyes. "Of course not-"

"Then why do you treat me like garbage?" She stepped closer, a dark glare levelled against him.

"What?" She rolled her eyes.

"You _lie_ , you said nana is sick."

"She is, that's why we're here, shopping for nana, and- and for a gift, for you-" He looked more and more desperate by the second, Will looked away. He almost felt embarrassed for him. The bus shuddered in behind them.

"You lie." She said again, stepping even closer. "Why do you lie?"

Mike stood, wordless and helpless, hands grasping at the air at his sides, El shifted her ice cream closer to her chest, voice hard and immovable.

" _I dump your ass._ " Max let out a delighted laugh, grabbing El's arm as Mike's mouth fell open. They moved toward the bus.

"Will?" She held out her free hand, the other one taken up by her ice cream cone and El's looped arm. "Come on." He looked back at Mike, at Lucas, who were both gaping wordlessly.

"Alright." He met Mike's eyes when he took her hand, watching even more colour flood his cheeks. They both grinned, laughing brightly and swapping ice cream cones, and he felt grateful just to be involved in their glowing joy. They were fiery comets, and he would trail them like the after image of a shooting star.


	2. head alone

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tw: mild period typical internalized homophobia

"You really shouldn't hang around them so much, they don't deserve you." Max was curled up in El's bed, reading a Wonder Woman comic and splitting a soda between the three of them, the radio was playing upbeat pop music, her hair was in twin plaits, long braids, one done by him, one by El. She kicked her feet up against the wall. "I mean, look at how happy we are after dumping them, you should just... friend dump them." He shrugged.

"I've known Mike since the first grade, he's always been my best friend. He's one of the most important people in my life-"

"So why do you let him treat you like garbage?" El asked, snatching a bottle of nail polish from Max's bag, immediately getting to work on painting her own nails a brilliant, electric green. "You should be important to him to, right? Make him show it."

"I guess, I've had more fun with you today than I've had with those two all summer." Max smiled brightly.

"Stay over with us tonight then, I'm sure Hop won't mind." Will's eyebrows furrowed.

"Are you sure?"

"He likes your mom, he's not gonna screw that up. Oh my god, look at this panel." She spun the comic, then just shifted on the bed, making room for him beside her, laughing. "Come read with us."

They slept over, the three of them reading and talking late into the night, it was at around midnight Max looked at him seriously.

"Why aren't you interested in all of this, this dating stuff we're doing?" He looked away, cheeks flaming red.

"I-" He took a steadying breath. "I'm not really... into girls." Understanding lit up in her bright eyes.

"You're gay?" He nodded, stiff and terrified. "That's okay, Will. Seriously. We support you no matter what." She grabbed his hand, then changed her mind, and pulled him into a hug. He felt stiff, El staring at the two of them, mystified.

"What is gay?" Will looked at her with watery green eyes, wiping at his face with nervous hands.

"It means I like boys the way I'm supposed to like girls. I want to kiss them and stuff." She smiled.

"That's allowed?" She tilted her head slightly.

"Not really, a lot of people don't like it, but those people are stupid. You should be able to love who you love, no questions asked." Max said, pulling him against her chest again, her comforting warmth settling against him.

"So, I could like girls, if I wanted to?" El smiled faintly.

"Yeah, you could." Max smiled too, and suddenly he felt like an invader in a strange land. "Or no one at all, it's all up to you."

Will leaned back against the wall.

"I've never told anyone before, nobody knows, not even Jonathan, I'm so ashamed of it. People call me a queer and stuff all the time but to actually know for sure? That would kill me." Max ran a hand through his hair, and they all curled up together on El's bed, slowly drifting to sleep with the lights on and the radio playing.


	3. pressure to party

El was asleep, curled up in front of the T.V., the screen still playing the credits of the movie they'd watched together. Max was laughing quietly, pulling Will into the bathroom with her, bright and joyful and alive. 

She peered up at him with her brilliant blue eyes, hair in plaits again, in her pyjamas, their third sleepover that week. She spoke in a little whisper.

"Can I paint your nails?" He stiffened. "I see you, you always watch when me and El do it, so I thought that maybe you wanted to try it. It's alright if you don't-"

"No." He said, surprising himself a little. She smiled, her freckled cheeks turning pink. "I mean, yeah, um, you can paint them if you want." She beamed, grabbing a little bottle of blue polish from her bag, shutting the bathroom door behind her. She sat cross legged on the floor, he sat across from her, watching her take the bottle between her fingers, holding his hand so carefully.

She painted each nail a bright blue, so intently focused, her little red eyebrows furrowed as she evenly coated every finger, painting the pinky fingers on both hands the same obnoxious, electric green on her and El's fingers.

"There." She said, voice a little thick. "Don't touch them until I say you can, alright? Now, let's talk without El here." Will's eyes went wide, he leaned closer.

"Why are we talking without El?"

Max rolled her eyes, spinning the cap onto the polish and settling back against the bathroom wall. "Because you have a crush on Mike."

Will felt an icy trickle of fear, pulling his hands away from her instinctively, like he'd been burned.

"That's ridiculous. Mike is my best friend, I could never, I wouldn't ever think of him-"

"Except you _totally_ _do_. I see how you look at him, Will, he's the most important person in your life, and he's focusing all of his energy on El. It must be awful." He searched for words, finally feeling his emotions bubble over, vision going fuzzy and watery with tears.

"I always felt so disgusting for it." Max pulled him close, careful not to touch his nail polish. He settled against her steady warmth. She smelled like the perfume she bought at the mall, perfume and strawberry soda. She was warm, and soft, and her hands were smoothing comforting circles over his shoulders. "I never told anybody, how could I? I felt guilty every time I looked at him, every time he smiled at me, or talked to me, I just feel wrong, Max. I feel like some kind of imposter. Like a spy." He could feel himself shaking.

"I know how it feels, Will." He pulled away, grabbing his cheeks, cradling his face in her hands. He stared at her, breathless and blurry and crying. Her voice dropped into a whisper so small he could hardly hear it. "I have a crush on El."

"Oh, Max." He wiped at his eyes, pulling her close. "I'm so sorry."


	4. don’t know how to keep loving you

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wrote this chapter ahead of time and it was the only reason I posted this fic lmao

He was having Max over for a sleepover tonight, Hop had drawn the line at three sleepovers in a week, so El was stuck at home.

They were watching _Texas Chainsaw Massacre_ , popcorn popped between them, twizzlers on the coffee table, sodas cracked open, blankets and comic books scattered all over. Max was in her pyjamas, a thin tank top and some little shorts, long red hair in tangled waves, the little bit of makeup she usually wore had been scrubbed away. She was rambling about the movie.

She loved horror, loved grisly facts about behind the scenes, loved special effects and real life serial killers. She was fixated on death in a way that might've been concerning if it wasn't so light and fun when she talked about it.

"...and apparently on set they used real human bones-" She stopped suddenly, a knock on the door cutting her off. Will left the movie playing, leaving their tangle of blankets to answer it.

His hair was still shoved out of the way, he was in one of Jonathan's old band shirts and a pair of plaid pants, barefoot and bleary, though it was only about 8:30. He swung open the door, and Mike was standing on the other side.

"Hey." He said, still dressed for the day, looking exhausted and worn. Will was stricken suddenly by how pretty he was, all dark eyes and pale skin and his stupid black hair. He wished it could have been anyone else, he wished he could have just loved a girl instead. Anyone but Mike Wheeler.

"What are you doing here?" Will asked, leaning on the doorframe. Mike looked uncomfortable, rubbing the back of his neck awkwardly.

"Can we talk?" Will shuffled from foot to foot, glancing over his shoulder. There were faint screams coming from the T.V., then startled laughter from Max.

"I'm busy, Mike." He heard the movie stop, and Max wandered over on bare feet. She looked pretty even like this. She had a blanket draped over her shoulders, she was walking as she talked, hardly noticing Mike at the door.

"I paused it so you can see, they're doing the nastiest effects right now, he's cutting off this guys _face_ -" She stopped talking very suddenly, seeing Mike, her smile falling.

"Wheeler." She raised an eyebrow. "Will and I are having a sleepover tonight, I would say come back tomorrow but we're going to El's." She crossed her arms over her chest and Will remembered very suddenly that she was just in a tank top. He tossed her a sweater off the hook without even looking.

Max had confided in him that she was uncomfortable around boys, scared of most of them. After Billy and her stepfather had yelled at her all her life about covering up so men wouldn't look at her it was hard to break that habit. She only felt comfortable around him because she knew he didn't see her that way, he would never see her in a sexual way. Mike might.

She pulled the sweater on, it was one of his, and so long on her it fell over her thighs. She shoved her hair aside, fixing Mike with her intent blue stare.

"I just need to talk to him." He said, looking at Max with vague confusion.

"Then _talk_." Her expression was hard and so was her voice, hands on her hips now, beautiful and strong in the warm light of his house.

"In private?" Will glanced at Max, who rolled her eyes. She grabbed Will's hand, giving it a squeeze, a stern little crease between her brows.

"Remember what we talked about. All of us." She glanced at Mike and went a little red. "You promised."

The three of them had sat in a circle in El's bedroom, writing down rules for their little group, a sort of code for dealing with the other boys. _Don't let anyone talk down to you. Don't let anyone treat you like garbage. Friendship comes before everything else. Don't keep secrets._

"I remember, don't worry." She seemed torn, then leaned over and kissed him on the cheek. He knew his face must have been blazing red.

He looked at Mike, and stepped out onto the porch, sitting on the front step and staring up at the cloudy summer sky.

"Why did you come to talk?" Mike didn't sit beside him, he strode past him, pacing, clearly unable to calm himself down.

"Why did you ditch us for the girls?" Will stiffened, looking past Mike, then at the ground, at his bare feet on the porch.

"Honestly, you and Lucas have done nothing but talk about them for months, and now you're getting pissed because I'm hanging out with them?"

"That's because they're our _girlfriends_ , Will! It's different."

"They aren't your girlfriends anymore, so is it really?" Mike stiffened. "Besides, I like spending time with them, they're fun, and we actually talk about things outside of who they're dating. They're much less... dramatic, than you and Lucas, I guess."

"Less dramatic? They're _girls_ , Will." He felt an icy feeling in the centre of his chest.

"What is that supposed to mean?" He finally met Mike's gaze, but it wasn't one of his usual soft looks, it was a glare.

"Aren't girls just automatically more dramatic than guys are? I mean, it's basically science."

"No." Will said flatly. "It basically isn't." He stood, taking a careful step backwards toward the house. "Thanks for coming by, Mike, this was a very interesting conversation-"

"Wait! Listen, I'm sorry, I'm being stupid, I just..." He ran a hand through his hair pacing again. "I miss you, alright?" Will froze.

"Mike-"

"Seriously, you're my best friend, Will. I can't just lose my best friend and my girlfriend in the space of a week that's just the worst possible situation to be in, and I miss hanging out with you. You know how you never notice how much you need something until it's gone, like, when you run out of milk or sugar or something and suddenly it's like all you can think about are all the things you can't make anymore?" Will tilted his head, nodding slowly. "That's what it's like when you're not around, I keep turning to talk to you and realizing that you aren't there, I just- I really miss you." Will sunk back to his spot on the porch, running an anxious hand through his hair.

"Well I don't miss hanging out with you and Lucas." Mike stiffened again, expression tightening. "It wasn't fun being around you anymore, I felt like I didn't even exist, all you two could talk about were girls, it was just boring, Mike. I was so bored, all the time. You've always been my best friend, but sometimes people's interests just change, and that isn't a bad thing, it just means they have to find new people to talk to and spend time with."

Mike took a step back, bewildered and clearly a little hurt.

"Are you- are you breaking up with me? Like her?” Will swallowed a smile, feeling that rush of power and adrenaline El had probably felt outside the mall, a burning, bubbling excitement.

"I'm not the same person I was last year, neither are you. We aren't growing together, Mike, we're growing apart, and sometimes that's just the way life is." He stumbled closer this time, kneeling in front of Will, hands on his knees with pleading eyes.

"You're actually just giving up?"

"I wasn't the one who gave up, Mike. You stopped being my friend a long time ago, a real friend, at least. It's funny, I can tell Max things I would never dream of telling you, and I've known you my entire life, yet you still aren't a safe person. You are absolutely terrifying, every time I told you something you turned it into some kind of joke, the Upside Down was off limits because that wasn't my trauma, it was your trauma too, so no one was allowed to touch it, but everything else? Fair game. You used to tease me about my dad, about the things people say at school, about my art and even stupid things like D&D. Everything is just meaningless to you unless the world is ending." Will took a deep breath. "So yeah, I'm breaking up with you." He stood, grabbing the handle on the door. "Goodbye, Mike."

Just as he was about to turn it, he felt a hand on his other wrist. Mike's hand.

"I'm sorry. I can be a better friend, Will, I can try harder, I just got so involved with all this El stuff and I shouldn't have just left you behind. I'm so sorry," He didn't let go of him, trying to look him in the eyes. "Please, Will."

"Why do you think I got so upset when you started spending all of your time with her?" Will said quietly.

"Because I wasn't with you guys, it was selfish, and-"

"That isn't why, Mike." Will shook off his hand. "What do you think it is that I'm so much more comfortable talking about with the girls but not you? Why do you think you are so terrifying to me?" He shook his head, eyes all wide and confused, hands loose at his sides.

"I-I don't know." Will steeled himself.

"I'm gay, Mike."

He watched all the blood drain from Mike's face, watched him go perfectly still, mouth falling open into an 'O'.

"Max is bisexual. She knew the second she saw me."

"Max is what?" He looked dazed, like he was walking in a dream.

"Bisexual. She likes both, boys and girls." He looked even more surprised, sinking down onto the steps, sitting numbly.

"That's a thing? You're allowed to like both?"

"Of course you're allowed to like both-"

"Why didn't you tell me?"

"Tell you what? That bisexuality exists? I'm so sorry Mike I figured you knew-"

"Not that." He waved a hand impatiently. "Why didn't you tell me that you're gay?"

Will sat beside him, wrapping his arms around his middle, looking into his eyes intently.

"You said it had something to do with El? What could she have to do with anything? She was just my girlfriend."

"Mike..." His energy faded, he just stared at Will, at his sad as hell green eyes and the hopeless little smile on his face. Understanding washed over him like ice water.

"You like me?" His voice was so small. He couldn't even look at him, staring at a spot on the ground, between his feet. "Hey, look at me, Will." He let his eyes flit upwards, and Mike grabbed his arm. "Will, look at me." He met his dark eyes, and suddenly, a pair of lips were on his.

Will's eyes went wide, he grabbed his forearm, letting his eyes close, letting himself lean into the kiss. Warm and soft and lingering, he could feel Mike's mouth on his. Mike was kissing him, Mike was moving his lips, and letting go of his hand to curl his fingers around his jaw.

Will pulled away, mouth hanging open, staring at Mike, who looked just as shocked, face bright red.

He pulled himself out of his arms, stumbling away from him, towards safety, toward his house and Max and popcorn and shitty horror movies.

"Goodbye, Mike."

He opened the door before he could respond, slamming it shut behind him.


End file.
